


Small, Medium, and Large in an Art History Class

by Glamourcat



Category: Original Work
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-31
Updated: 2015-07-31
Packaged: 2018-04-12 06:23:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4468628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glamourcat/pseuds/Glamourcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An art history student manages to surprise not only her professor but a class bully.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Small, Medium, and Large in an Art History Class

Title: Small, Medium, and Large in an Art History Class  
Author: J.R. Cooper  
Date Completed: 11/10/98  
Part: 1 of 1  
Warnings: TV-13 for Mild language  
Disclaimer: All characters are mine and may not be used without express permission.  
Summary: An art history student manages to surprise not only her professor but a class bully.  
Distribution: https://www.tumblr.com/blog/jrcsmin  
Notes: This was written for a class assignment back in college. The professor and class bully are loosely based on real people. 

“Okay class, this may be hard for you to stomach but this is art and you have to deal with it.” Dr. Joe Iguana put his hands sharply down on his books to emphasize his point.  
“Jannis Kounellis’ piece of the twelve horses is an excellent example of the Atre Povre period. Can anyone tell me how it applied to the conceptual thinking done in this time?”  
“I don’t see how it could be conceptual in thinking. It was a bunch of smelly horses in a room that they didn’t belong in, soiling the floors.” The class malcontent spoke up. He slunk back into his chair having offered his one opinion for the day.  
“I beg to differ Gary,” Dr. Iguana argued. “Does any one else want to offer an opinion?” He looked around the room hopefully. All he saw was a classroom of squirming students.  
“Ennie, meenie, myni, moe….” The professor fell back to his oldest way of calling on someone. He chose the one who had sunk down into their seat the most. “Jerica. Can you explain why this was considered a work of art?”  
“Oh, um, um…” Jerica sprang straight up in her seat, as if someone had thrown a switch to wake her up. “Well, I guess it’s like the beauty of nature.”  
“That’s good.” He’d actually gotten a half way decent answer from her. Now if he could only get the rest of the class to help her expand the idea. “I swear getting this class to talk is like pulling teeth without novocaine.”  
“Now, what about it represents the beauty of nature?”  
Dr. Iguana scanned the class looking for other likely faces. To his utter surprise Kelly raised her hand. The one person who hasn’t spoken a word all semester was volunteering!  
“Yes, Kelly. Please join in the conversation.”  
“Well, instead of the horse being represented in paint, you know, instead of the paint fooling the viewer into seeing a horse you’re actually seeing the horse. Nature already made the horse a beautiful animal so why should you need a canvas to make it obvious to you?”  
Before Dr. Iguana could comment the class malcontent, Gary sat up with a causal movement and added his two bits. “Horses aren’t beautiful to everyone. What’s so special about them being in a gallery? It had to smell real bad in there. They had to be making noise. That’s such an unnatural place to be sponsoring the idea of natural beauty.”  
“But that’s the point.” Kelly became animated, waving her hands with her speech. “You’d have walked right by them if they were in a field. Just another herd of horses on a farm. No second thought, no revelation of ‘Oh my G-d, what a elegant form and wonderful color combined into an animal.’ In a gallery you’re forced to stop and take notice of them for what they are.”  
“Yea, animals who shit on the floor.” Gary shot back pulling his baseball cap down across his eyes.  
Kelly curled back up into her seat. With her brunette hair falling in front of her face, her mouth pursed into a thin, grim line. Her brows furrowed and she played violently with the clicker on her pen.  
Iguana sighed. “Those were some very good comments Kelly. Gary, your statements are always welcome but don’t you think you could cut down on the inappropriate language? This is an art history course not the Jerry Springer show. We don’t have a magic editing machine that edits out the curses into nice little bleeps.”  
“I guess so.” Gary muttered from somewhere under his arm. He had his head down on his desk and his eyes covered.   
“I see we have run over our time and I’m sure the next class is waiting to get in. I’ll see you all again on Tuesday. Please make sure that you read the next chapter in your text.”  
The class of roughly 17 to 19 (give or take the occasional skip) filled out of the room. Three or four shot out of the class like they were on a catapult. One of them was Kelly.  
Iguana sighed again as he gathered his books up and placed them in his brown leather satchel. “I’ll probably never get her to talk again now that Gary blasted her down like that. She gets demoralized so easily.”   
The professor, a man of average stature, seemed smaller as he left the room wondering how he could have handled the class better.  
The weekend rolled by. Dr. Iguana read up on the next chapter, got his slides in order, read the papers for one of his other classes and still managed to sneak in dinner and a movie with a friend. He went into the school week thinking of nothing of last Thursday’s class and the argument between Kelly and Gary.  
He walked into the classroom. Concerned with being late, he had his head down and was checking his pocket watch as he turned to face the spot where his desk usually was. He ran into a solid, massive, live form.  
“What in the…!?” He looked up shocked, his brown eyes widened to twice their normal size.  
There was a horse in front of him. A GIANT horse in front of him. A Clydesdale to be exact. The chestnut colored animal looked at him with soft brown eyes and sniffed at his hair. Dr. Iguana dropped his satchel in utter shock. The horse pricked his ears forward at the sound of the bag falling and lowered his head to sniff at the satchel.   
Dr. Iguana moved slowly around the Clydesdale and received a second shock, and a third one even. Next to the Clydesdale was a pure white Arabian. Arabians are averaged sized horses and this mare stood at maybe half the height the Clydesdale stallion did. On the other side of the mare was a tiny American Shetland pony. The little animal was a dapple-gray in color and was riffling through someone’s book bag.  
Kelly was standing next to the Arabian mare holding the mare’s nose to calm her. “Hi.”  
“Hi Kelly.” Dr. Iguana was at a loss for words. “Would you mind maybe telling me why there are three horses in my classroom?”  
“Last week’s class discussion inspired me to do an installation of my own. I call this piece Small, Medium, and Large in an Art History Class. The big fellow over there is Lazy Joe, this lovely lady is Blizzard, and the little troublemaker over there is Pickpocket. I borrowed them from the stable I ride at for this installation.”  
“Nice to meet you.” He started to nod at Lazy Joe, realized he was greeting a horse and shook his head clear of fog. “Why?”  
“I just thought the best way to prove my point was to demonstrate it.” She answered. “I’ll explain more when…oops, here he is now.”  
Gary has just come sauntering around the corner into the class (ten minutes late) and skidded to a halt. His books hit the floor. The noise made Blizzard snort and shed sideways. Kelly reached out a hand to calm her.  
“What the fuck!?” He moved around Lazy Joe, giving the seven foot tall horse a wide berth. “What the hell is this?”  
“I’m so glad you decided to come to class, Gary.” Kelly smiled like a little angel.  
Dr. Iguana could swear he saw tiny devil horns peaking through her hair. He listened to their exchange fascinated.  
“You see, I didn’t think you understood what I was talking about last week. I said that if you saw these horses anywhere else you’d walk right by them, not realizing their beauty.”  
Iguana nodded to himself, half in wonder. She was right; the animals she’d brought were excellent examples of their breeds. “How’d see get them in here without anyone noticing? How’d she keep the rest of the class quiet until Gary and I got here?”  
“So by doing this little installation I thought I would drive home the point of setting making all the difference in a work of art. You pay more attention to these horses and their size relationships here in this classroom then you would out in a field.” Kelly finished explaining.  
Pickpocket had wandered from her place up to Gary. She was nosing around his back pocket where he had a Hershey’s Bar stashed.   
“Get away from me you little freak!” He took a swipe at Pickpocket’s muzzle. The pony was too quick and easily ducked out of his way.  
Pickpocket bared her teeth and put her ears back in annoyance. She lunged forward and tore at his back pocket with her powerful jaw. His jeans tore and the candy bar fell. The Shetland picked it up and skittered back to her corner.  
“Hey! That’s mine!” Gary shouted.  
“Now you know why we named her Pickpocket.” Kelly said over the snickering in the classroom.  
Lazy Joe rested his great head, which was almost the size of Iguana’s whole torso, on the professor’s shoulder and heaved a great sigh.  
“I’m with you on that one Lazy Joe.” He absently scratched the Clydesdale’s ears. It suddenly occurred to him exactly what was going on.  
Here he was, a middle aged professor, who was supposed to be giving a follow up lecture on Atre Povre, was petting a horse whose back he couldn’t even see over! There was one more horse and a thieving pony in his classroom cutting into his lecture time!  
He sat down right in the middle of the floor and leaned against Lazy Joe’s front legs. He put his head in his hands and sighed. A worried look crossed Kelly’s face and she wondered for the first time if she hadn’t gone too far.  
Lazy Joe dropped his head and nudged the man leaning on him. The professor peaked out with one eye in-between two fingers. The man looked at the horse and the horse looked at the man. The both sighed at the same time. Dr. Iguana put his head back into his hands. He started to shake. Very slowly at first, but then it became more obvious. He was laughing and laughing hysterically. He draped his hands on his knees and laughed as if it were the first time in years.   
The entire class, horses, and pony included looked at him as if he’d gone mad. His laughter died down as he got control of himself.  
He wiped tears of laughter away from his eyes and gave Lazy Joe’s muzzle a friendly slap. “I think you proved your point very effectively Kelly. And you know what? I’d be interested in having this exhibition in the Art History Department. Do you think Small, Medium, and Large will fit into the faculty lounge over in the Fine Arts building?”  
“Oh, I’m sure they would.” Kelly answered right away. “But the hard part is going to be getting them up the stairs.”  
Lazy Joe, Blizzard, and Pickpocket swung their heads straight up and stared at each other, eyes wide.


End file.
